Fans of ‘The Godfather‘ movie hold on to your chairs, the coolest line of collectibles is about to hit the market.

MINDstyle has just announced it has signed an agreement with Paramount Licensing Inc. to launch a line of art toy collectibles, inspired by ‘The Godfather‘ movie. This cool Don Vito Corleone marionette will be presented in a limited edition collectors box, on July 19th, at the “Familly Tradition” art exhibition, in Los Angeles.

Two more Michael Lau-designed toys will follow in the fall, so stay tuned.

via MINDstyle

Are you a smoker? Are you having a boring day at the office? Have we got a challenge for you!Try making one of these babies out of your cigarette pack.

I mean who knew something so cool could come out of something as useful as a cigarette pack. And it’s not like one of those folded-paper-planes that my father used to make for me when I was a kid, it’s a freaking fighter plane.

That does it, if I can’t quit smoking, I might as well learn to do cool things with the cigarette packs. Either that or switch to those electronic cigarettes thingies.

Sadly, just like with the edible hat, we couldn’t find the original source of these pics, so if you’ve seen them somewhere else or know who post them, let us know so we can give credit to this true origami master.

Gundam fans all over the world, rejoice! The life-sized RX78 Gundam robot has been completed and is expecting visitors.

Just like the Hello Kitty Castle in Shanghai, China, might become a pilgrimage site for pink-loving girls, Tokyo’s RX78 could turn into the same thing for robot-anime enthusiasts. Announced back in March, as a way of celebrating 30 years since the debut of the Mobile Suit Gundam anime series, the 1:1 sale Gundam has just been completed.

The RX78 Gundam towers 18 meters, features a movable head, 50 light-radiating points on his body, and shoots smoke from various fiberglass-reinforced plastic parts. The popular mech will be watching over Odaiba’s Shiokaze Park until August 31st. Hopefully they’ll just move it somewhere else after that, because depriving Gundam fans of such a symbol would be a regular crime.

Some might think the RX78 Gundam looks a bit too retro for 2009, but it’s a regular icon in Japanese culture, so choosing what model to build was never in question.

See even more photos at pyunari part 1 and pyunari part 2

40,000 small terracotta soldiers storm into the Spanish Barn, in Torquay, Devon.

The Terracotta Army is a famous art collection, by British artist Anthony Gormley, featuring 40,000 clay figurines. They were all made in St. Helen’s, Merseyside, as a community project. Children and their families were given clay balls to manipulate into a human shape, with two eyes. Each person created up to 200 terracotta figurines per day.

Now the Terracotta Army has been moved from London’s South Bank Center into the Torre Abbey’s Spanish Barn, in Torquay, Devon. All the 40,000 lilliputian terracotta soldiers must face in the same direction and must be viewed from a certain angle. That’s why volunteers were needed to walk through the ranks and arrange the figurines.

The young lady in the second photo is one such volunteer, walking carefully among the 8 to 26-cm-tall statuettes, in her socks. If one of the soldiers were to fall, it could lead to a disastrous domino effect.

Anthony Gormley’s Terracotta Army will be stationed inside the abbey for the summer, if you fancy a visit.

Photos by SWNS

via Daily Mail

Nothing says ‘I love you dad!’ like a sweet cake in the shape of a Mercedes Benz convertible.

With Father’s Day approaching, a cake-shop from Suzhou, China, has come up with a line of special cakes, to boost business. This blue Mercedes cake is just one of the many cool Father’s Day presents that can be found in the markets of Suzhou.

via Moobol

That’s right Star Wars fans, the deadliest weapon in the universe has been reduced to cooking burgers in somebody’s backyard.

Bryan A. Tate though it would be interesting to use two common Weber grills to create the ultimate Star Wars cooking device, the Death Star  Grill. It is painted in completely safe barbecue paint on the inside and engine enamel on the outside, so it should hold up to temperatures up to 500 degrees. It even has some cool Star Destroyer handles and the best thing is, you can have it. That’s right, Bryan is auctioning his Death Star Grill on eBay and the opening bid is $50.

via bryanatate

Did Adolf Hitler miss his true calling? Should he have dedicated his life to painting instead of wreaking havoc across Europe? You be the judge.

These are only a few of the Fuhrer‘s “masterpieces”, another set was auctioned at the end of April and managed to raise close to $150,000. Experts say the paintings appear to be genuine, but they’re not quite impressed with Hitler’s work. In fact, the gennocidal dictator had a largely unsuccessful career as a painter, in his early days. Who knows, maybe it was frustration that lead him to ending millions of innocent lives.

Fan of Adolf Hitler, are you? Well you’ll probably never afford one of his paintings, but you can at least buy yourself the Hitler action-figure, if you can find it.

via Sina.com Forum

Finally, the world-famous Japanese character gets a proper home…in China.

Now loyal Hello Kitty fans from around the world can start their pilgrimage to the Hello Kitty Castle that was inaugurated in Shanghai. Not much I can say about this place, it’s very pink and girly-like and, judging by the popularity of Hello Kitty, it might just become the new Mecca.

One thing that would fit perfectly in the Hello Kitty Castle is the Hell-Kitty Rifle, an AR-15 rifle personalized by a Californian weapon enthusiast.

via China.org.cn

And it’s not just for show guys, people actually live in it!

Ever since he was a little boy, Simon Dale dreamed of having a house in the countryside. And even though he’s no architect, or even a construction worker, together with his father-in-law and the help of passers-by, Simon managed to build this amazing Hobbit House in just 4 months. Believe it or not this baby only cost around 3,000 pounds to build.

Though it looks absolutely incredible, aesthetics were not Mr. Dale’s primary concerns. He tried to make his dream home as environment-friendly as he possibly could and hopes he set an example for others. Simon Dale and his family actually moved into the Hobbit House, but they are not stopping here. Their next project involves building nine other similar houses in Pembrokeshire, Britain.

For more info check Simon Dale’s official website

Here are a few specifications of the Hobbit House:

”

• Dug into hillside for low visual impact and shelter
• Stone and mud from diggings used for retaining walls, foundations etc.
• Frame of oak thinnings (spare wood) from surrounding woodland
• Reciprocal roof rafters are structurally and aesthaetically fantastic and very easy to do
• Straw bales in floor, walls and roof for super-insulation and easy building
• Plastic sheet and mud/turf roof for low impact and ease
• Lime plaster on walls is breathable and low energy to manufacture (compared to cement)
• Reclaimed (scrap) wood for floors and fittings
• Anything you could possibly want is in a rubbish pile somewhere (windows, burner, plumbing, wiring…)
• Woodburner for heating – renewable and locally plentiful
• Flue goes through big stone/plaster lump to retain and slowly release heat
• Fridge is cooled by air coming underground through foundations
• Skylight in roof lets in natural feeling light
• Solar panels for lighting, music and computing
• Water by gravity from nearby spring
• Compost toilet
• Roof water collects in pond for garden etc.”

If you’re into Transformers and jewelry, you’re going to love this custom made Optimus Prime Ring.

Artist Dans-Magic, from Deviant Art, spent 50 hours working on this one of a kind 14k piece of jewelry. He had originally carved the triangle eye sockets, but the client wanted rubies, so he had to comply. Dans-Magic also created an Optimus Prime pendant that you can see in the photo at the bottom.

via Deviant Art

make your photos look like they’re from Google Streetview with just a little tape, cardboard and acrylic. That’s how these Japanese dudes did it and it looks kick-ass. Those of you familiar with Streetview will see the photos these boys made look just like the real thing. Head over to the original source if you want to learn exactly how they did it.

via Daily Portal

What can you do with 1,000 Tivoli radios? That’s an easy one, build a 15-foot-high audio tower, of course.

Nicknamed the “Tower of Babel” this technological oddity was presented at the Milan Design Week 2009, to promote the audio supplier’s collaboration with Italian designer Giulio Cappellini. The Audio Tower of Babel was very popular in Milan, so it will be reconstructed in Moscow, London and Paris. Be sure to check it out if you’re into audio stuff.

You can watch the building process of Tivoli’s Tower of Babel, in the video at the bottom.

via Dvice

These are some of the most realistic trompe l’oeil murals I have ever seen.

John Pugh has to be one of the most talented trompe l’oeil painters in the world. He creates unbelievably realistic murals that trick the viewer’s eye into seeing a three-dimensional scene. Pugh’s works can be seen all across the world, from New Zealand to Hawaii.

Photos by John Pugh/ BARCROFT

via Telegraph.co.uk

You know what the best thing about this mean-machine is? IT CAN BE YOURS!

That’s right, created by artist Jake Hildebrandt, for the release of Damnation (a video-game from Codemasters), this Steampunk PC is now the prize of a competition initiated by Destructoid. All you have to do is show your love for Steampunk design. The most original comment gets to take home this cool rig. Unfortunately the contest is only available to people in Canada and the US. You have until June 19 to enter.

The Damnation Steampunk PC sports an Intel Core i7 965 processor, 12 gigabytes of DD3 RAM, an X57 chipset motherboard, dual Radeon 4870X2 graphics-card and 1 terabyte of hard-drive. So it’s not just a “pretty face”, this baby can handle just about anything you throw at it.

I like Datamancer’s Steampunk Laptop a bit more, but Jake Hildebrandt’s work of art isn’t bad either.

photos via Jack of All Trades on Flickr

Animation can have a weird effect on people. For example, this guy built a custom Wall-E pc case after watching the famous animation movie.

This Russian fellow spent 18 days building this awesome pc case mod from scratch, after watching Wall-E. He just fely had to have Wall-E hold his computer components and because there was no such case on the market, he decided to build it himself. I have to say the result is nothing less than mind-blowing, and watching the entire building process on Casemods.ru, made me admire his work even more.

I’m sure many of you would kill to have such a thing of beauty sitting on your desk, and, to be honest, I would too.